Press Statement NOT EXACTLY HONOURABLE OR ACCURATE; THE US STATE DEPARTMENT HUMAN RIGHTS REPORT ON ETHIOPIA

The US State Department’s 2008 Human Rights Reports, issued on February 26, 2009, cover human rights situations in virtually every country in the world, including Ethiopia of course. There is one exception, the United States. No one expects all the countries covered to be treated equally. These reports are certainly not produced with methodological rigor, objectivity or even-handedness. Alleged killings in some states are treated almost in passing, and for reasons we don’t need to comment on at length, even designated as ‘corporal punishment’ and then almost in a whisper. In other cases, as in Ethiopia, they get grossly exaggerated treatment. Under the title ‘Arbitrary or Unlawful Deprivation of Life’, and a heading ‘Security forces committed arbitrary and politically motivated killings during the year’, the Report on Ethiopia for example notes just two cases involving local militia and police, in the second case adding that an arrest has been made. It follows this with nine paragraphs relating to fatal bomb attacks by opposition groups including the ONLF. One has to ask how and why this can be listed under actions of the security forces?

In fact, from the outset it is clear this report is taking a deliberately jaundiced view of Ethiopia’s progress in human rights. The EPRDF and its allied parties are even taken to task for winning most of the seats in the local elections in April last year, with the accusation that its victory actually “diminished the opportunities for mainstream political activity”. The report even manages to suggest the government’s victory constitutes human rights abuse because it limits citizens’ rights to change the government. The EPRDF victory in the local elections last April was certainly impressive but is the report really suggesting only a lost election provides satisfactory evidence of human rights progress? That is a truly bizarre suggestion.

The report makes constant reference to ‘anecdotal’ evidence, to ‘estimates of hundreds’ of political prisoners, and talks of ‘some’ detained, or ‘some’ released. Again and again, the report makes assertions for which it admits it has no proof, reports allegations as fact. Its approach is very similar to that of Human Rights Watch, and the methodology appears equally flawed. It makes similar errors, calling the ONLF a nationalistic insurgent movement, when, in fact, it is an organization rejected by the vast majority of the population of the Somali Regional State. Its activities, some of which the report does note, deserve to be classified as terrorist: landmines on public roads, bombs in hotels and at public meetings, assassinations of local officials, and clan elders. The cold-blooded massacre of 64 Somali workers asleep or lining up for breakfast, including women and a child, is surely more than a mere “slaying”, but then none of those killed were US citizens One might also ask why the report only suggests the ONLF is “allegedly” supported by Eritrea. The UN Monitoring Group has produced plenty of evidence of this; the ONLF doesn’t deny it; captured prisoners have given detail of their training in Eritrea; even Eritrea doesn’t deny it. Of course, it is also widely known, as would also be confirmed by many U.S. scholars, that the ONLF has been known, as bizarre as it may seem, to serve as a source of intelligence for many States and agencies.

The US Government is fully aware from its own satellite imagery that the ONLF and Human Rights Watch allegations of burnt villages are untrue. This report confines itself to innuendo about the appointment of a “former ruling party insider” to lead the Government’s investigations. It doesn’t bother to note the investigation actually uncovered ample evidence of the failures of HRW’s techniques and methodology. We cannot pretend to know better than the State Department, but one thought that it is the content of reports and the rigor of the methodology employed that count, not the biography of the authors of the reports. It's a fault to which US embassy officials are equally prone.

There are instances of deliberate misrepresentation. The idea that Mrs. Birtukan Mideksa was re-arrested for telling the truth is a misrepresentation bordering on the sinister. Her re-arrest was not a political but a legal action; the report's account of it most certainly is political. Similarly the comments on Teddy Afro appear to be a deliberate attempt to interfere in Ethiopia's internal judicial affairs. And the Government is dismayed that the State Department continues to publish allegations from opposition groups continuously misrepresenting the human rights situation in Ethiopia.

This report misrepresents facts while making little or no effort to mention the enormous progress made in the promotion and protection of human rights in Ethiopia: in training for the judiciary, both federal and regional, in training for the military and security services, for the riot police, in the activities of the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (which, it might be mentioned in passing are not secret – its reports are regularly presented to Parliament) and the Ombudsman. The progress made for example in ensuring gender equality, land holding rights, maternal health care services, treatment of refugees, provision of small ethnic groups in the legislative process are hidden away or misrepresented. It is, incidentally, a complete fabrication that Ethiopia has unofficial prisons. All prisons are accessible and are visited regularly by local and international bodies which have a mandate to do so. And whatever's said about torture is pure invention, beneath contempt.

This report, deliberately and consistently, minimizes and denigrates any advances. It is carefully written to disparage. The aim is to find fault, and that is never difficult to do. No one is perfect; Guantanamo Bay springs to mind. The litany of allegations in this report doesn’t represent reality. It does not show any pattern of violation or policy direction. It is no more than a collection of unsubstantiated accusations from groups seeking to undermine Ethiopia’s process of democratization. The annual report of the US State Department is perhaps an inevitable and annual irritant in the otherwise excellent relations between the US and Ethiopia. But Human Rights are a noble and an important cause. It is a cause we fully believe in and support. It is not something that should be subject to such sloppy, bungling research and inept methodology as this report demonstrates, nor should it be politicized as it has been here. We expect considerably better from the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor of the State Department of the US.